Happy early Samhain! This year our Halloween Special happens a few days before the actual day of the celebration. You might have noticed I trimmed the Spooky Tribes list a little bit. Most notably Pirate is gone, since with the new additions from the Ixalan block, the tribe has taken a wider nautical flavor, and it doesn't really make sense to field it among the various monsters anymore. Also, don't miss the 1-tix special prize that replaces the Underdog Prize for the event: you just have to drop All Hallow's Eve on the battlefield. Doesn't matter how, doesn't matter how long for, just have it there, take a screenshot for posterity, and that's the trick that'll get a treat for you.

Event link (with all players, pairings, standings, decks, and results): here it is

Whoa, Nagarjuna built a seriously powerful Rat deck. Copying Chittering Rats with Phantasmal Image is nasty (it resulted in three Time Walks in a row against me). Of course copying Pack Rat is even worse. And now the tribe has double the amount of Ravenous Rats – in fact, Burglar Rat is even strictly better, even if it doesn't really matter in 1v1.

Generalissimo and I were playing our new shared project, of which you'll read everything in the next Building Lab (once it'll become live). For now, you can just admire the intricacies of this design. Or something like that. It's Snake ramp with Primeval Bounty as a centerpiece, anyway.

And as this week's "things you don't see played often", here's lovetapsmtg's Slith list. Which is actually very well-devised, with pretty much all conceivable counters shenanigans, +1/+1 and otherwise.

Told you, this week Show and Tell relocated to its bigger brother Building Lab! (As we're going to do each month until Generalissimo finds something better to do with his time). See you there! But not right now because it's not been published yet! Are you so eager to see those Snakes crawling their way to victory, uh?

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Just to remind you of a few things:

The Underdog Prize: During any event of the regular rotation (but not necessarily during the one-time special events), all players who are running an Underdog Tribe are eligible for a 1-tix credit certificate from MTGO Traders. The tie-breakers are first the number of Underdog categories (for instance, a tribe that's simultaneously Endangered and Unhallowed will take the prize over one that's only Endangered), then the points achieved in the final standings.

The Up-and-Coming Prize: When a tribe wins an event for the first time ever (losing Unhallowed status), its pilot will get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders.

The New Kids on the Block Award: When a new tribe is introduced in the game, or reaches enough members to be played as a proper tribe (i.e. at least 3 members, so you can build a deck that features 4 copies of each plus 8 Changeling creatures), the first player to score a match win with it will get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. You'll need a hard win, not a BYE or a win by no-show of your opponent. There's currently one tribe eligible for the award: Azra from Battlebond.

The Repopulation Award: Some tribes get played only once (to get the New Kids on the Block Award) and then forgotten. Never again! Register one of the following tribes three times in different events, then play all rounds of those events with them, and you'll get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. The list of these tribes, established May 5, 2017, is as follows: Antelope, Goat, Incarnation, Licid, Monger, Nightstalker, Orgg, Ouphe, Rabbit, Salamander. Already cleared: Atog, Crocodile, Homarid, Jackal, Leech, Manticore, Metathran, Moonfolk, Octopus, Ox, Processor, Siren, Slith.

The Hamtastic Award: The Biodiversity Prize dedicated to the memory of Erik Friborg rewards each player who registers 10 different tribes (except Human, Elf and Goblin) during the year with a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. You can go on and win the prize multiple times in the year, but you need to keep playing different tribes! (So if you manage to register 50 different tribes in one season, you can get up to 15 tix!)

The Top Players Lockout: Every time a Top Player (either a Google Era Top 8, an Ultimate Champion/Tribal Player of the Year, or a seasonal Top 8) will end undefeated, they will not be allowed to register the same tribe and deck again for 5 events (i.e. they'll have to register a different deck or decks 5 times before coming back to the undefeated one). With "deck" is meant a specific, recognizable archetype (e.g. Wall-Drazi), which in some case will be linked to a specific combo card (e.g. Helm of Obedience). A list of the current lockouts is maintained here.

We're on Discord! Join us fromhere, chat about tribal things with other tribal players and arrange tribal games on MTGO all week long! (Or your can just keep using our Google Sheets bulletin board).